Only JPC can expose 2G scam: Prakash Karat

Describing the 2G spectrum allocation as the biggest scam of India, CPI(M) general secretary Prakash Karat on Sunday said that only a Joint Parliamentary Committee (JPC) probe will bring the truth to light.

“This Rs 1.76 lakh crore scam is the biggest one after independence and we want a JPC probe into it to bring truth to light,” Mr Karat said at a function organised here to launch the party’s week-long nationwide campaign against corruption.

The 1.76 lakh crore should be recovered, he said.

Demanding reallocation of the 2G spectrum, Mr Karat said many companies were given licenses illegally allowing them to make huge profits in the short span of two to three months. For the last two weeks, Parliament proceedings have been stalled and the opposition is demanding JPC probe into the 2G spectrum allocation, he said.

The CPI(M) leader said the CBI was too slow in its investigation into the 2G spectrum scam and has not done anything noteworthy in the last 13 months. The CBI has become a tool of the Centre, which uses the investigating agency against opposition leaders, he said.

Mr Karat said it took three years for former Telecom Minister A Raja to resign over the 2G spectrum. Prime Minister Dr Manmohan Singh had written a letter to A Raja in connection with allocation of 2G spectrum in November 2007. But after this, the PM did nothing in this regard, he alleged.

Commenting on the alleged scams related to the Commonwealth Games (CWG), Mr Karat said though the Organising Committee and its chairman Suresh Kalmadi were under scanner, role of Delhi and the Central governments in conducting the Games should also be probed. Noting that Rs 960 crore had been spent in modernisation of the Jawaharlal Nehru stadium in Delhi for the CWG, he said that a huge stadium had come up in Hyderabad for Rs 90 crore.

Mr Karat said Karnataka Chief Minister B S Yeddyurappa should resign in the wake of corruption charges against him so that a fair probe could be conducted against him. He said that a nexus of politicians, industrialists and bureaucrats has flourished under the Government’s economic policies, which was breeding corruption. “This needs to be destroyed,” he said.

Corruption has become a threat to democracy, Mr Karat said, adding that steps were needed to eradicate it.

AIDWA demands comprehensive mechanism to regulate MFIs

AIDWA plans to launch a protracted struggle at State and national-level

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AIDWA members hold survey in Kothapatnam and other parts of Prakasam district

They will call on Minister for Indira Kranthi Patham V Sunita Lakshma Reddy

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All India Democratic Women's Association (AIDWA) is bracing itself for protracted struggles both at the national and state levels to exert pressure on the Reserve Bank of India, the Union and State Governments to put in a comprehensive mechanism to regulate microfinance institutions (MFIs), which were holding in their clutches poor women debtors.

Informing this to reporters here on Sunday, AIDWA Andhra Pradesh State secretary Swaroopa Rani said the AIDWA had completed a State-wide with 30-point questionnaire in the wake of suicide by over 100 women in the State in the last three months due to forcible collection and arm-twisting by MFI agents.

“We will discuss the findings at our State committee meeting in Hyderabad on December 9. This will be followed by an AIDWA meet in New Delhi on December 18 to chalk out agitation programmes in support of the distressed women in the country,'' she said.

She said it was found by AIDWA members during the survey in Kothapatnam and other parts of Prakasam district that “taking loans from RBI at 8 per cent interest, the MFIs are charging as high as 48 to 60 per cent from poor women whose credit needs were not met by public sector banks''.

She said a delegation of AIDWA leaders would call on Minister for Indira Kranthi Patham V Sunita Lakshma Reddy and press for inclusion of certain clauses in the bill to replace the ordinance on MFIs during the winter session of the State Assembly.

Provisions should be made to regulate rate of interest charged by MFIs, increase the number of equated instalments and do away with collective responsibility of the entire group for any individual to meet her obligation, she said.

“Over one crore women members of Self Help Groups are in a precarious position not getting the ‘Pavala vaddi' promised by the Government,'' she lamented, adding that the continuance of the co-contributory pension scheme Abhayahastham also remained a big question mark.

She claimed that Chief Minister N Kiran Kumar Reddy seemed to be more preoccupied with political agenda of making Congress leader Rahul Gandhi as the future Prime Minister.

He had failed to win the confidence of women and other sections by addressing various issues facing them, she contended.

(Courtesy : The Hindu)